May is well and truly upon us and with it, the kind of mass migrations that make your heart pump and blood sing. We should all be moving somewhere this weekend, if only to be consistent to the spirit of the season. Where will you be making your move this weekend? Will you be birding? Let us know what you’ve got planned in the comments below.
I believe I’ll be birding somewhere special this weekend but my wife is keeping our destination secret from me. I suppose I could turn up anywhere in the northeast U.S. so if you’re around, keep an eye out! Corey will be making the rounds throughout the NYC Metro area. Look for him too since he’s been getting on some great birds lately. As for Charlie, I’m afraid I have no idea where he’ll be this weekend but if we’re lucky, he’ll bring back awe-inspiring photos like these.
Whatever your plans this weekend, make time to enjoy SkyWatch Friday…
Keep your eyes to the skies for regal raptors like this Red-tailed Hawk over Montezuma NWR
I’ll be birding at work this weekend and hoping some migrants decide to stop by the wetlands. We’ve had a very spotty spring for warblers. Two weeks ago I had 13 species of warbler one afternoon and this week nothing. Not a single neotrop around.
Hopefully I’ll be able to match my recent Cerulean Warbler…
Full slate!
1. Rye, NY Marshlands tonight for a second view of the male, breeding plumage Ruff if it persists.
2. Doodletown, NY (Bear Mountain State Park), Saturday dawn patrol for warblers (where Cerulean is a lead pipe cinch) then a quick jaunt down the 9W to join Rockland Audubon checking out migrants at the Stony Point Battlefield.
3. Garrett Mountain, Paterson, NJ, Saturday afternoon.
4. Rural Somerset/Hunterdon Counties, NJ, early evening Saturday to scout my sites for citizen science work on the annual NJAS Grassland Birds Survey.
5. “Old Local Patch Retro Sunday”: Liberty State Park and other favorite spots in Hudson County, NJ I used to bird heavily back in my Hoboken days.
Next weekend: Ohio’s Erie Lakeshore for the finest Spring Migration birding anywhere!
Beautiful.
Have a great weekend.
Visit my Sky Watch @ Now and Then
Swan Lake State Park, Iowa: keynote lecture Saturday night, warblers and other migrants the rest of the time.
It’s our last month of autumn and we’re heading to winter. Right now, the wintry chill is on the air already. The birding would probably just be home. However, speaking of birds, our surrounding environ right here where I live is a habitat of birds per se because of trees that fence around us. Many of them including the colourful ones. Lovely lone bird on his flight to nowhere.
I will be birding Chico Basin Ranch Friday and Saturday in El Paso County, Colorado, then down to La Veta on Sunday in hopes of finding Lewis Woodpeckers! Good luck on your birding adventures!
I’ll be on the Rio Salado Habitat Restoration Project monthly bird walk.
Ops, forgot the location – Rio Salado Habitat Restoration Project is in Phoenix Arizona.
Will hit Central Park and, depending on the weather, Jamaica Bay or Forest Park. A Wed jaunt thru CP got a handful of warblers (yeah!) but Thursday, similar time, found zippo at Forest Park.
First trip to Delmarva next weekend. Yippee! Shorebirds!!! (trying to get myself prepared). Memorial day will find me in Salt Lake City for the first time. Probably will look for a guide, since, as a newbie, I don’t want to miss a chance to snag some of those lovely feathered friends mentioned in the guide books. 😉
I am birding on the south Cumbrian penninsula this weekend -and have been for the last two weeks. Birds typically return from winter migrations in late March in this area. Over the last seven years I have noted thousands of european starlings in my neighbourhood on any given morning or evening. This year, however, only four single birds have returned -two nesting pairs. I have read about reports of these european starlings being poisoned by state agriculture departments in New Jersey earlier this spring(and in other states) in the USA, and have seen videos posted on youtube (“Birds Falling Out of the Sky”), and noted afterward of the great lack of birds in my area. Indeed, there are very few birds at all in this part of north England this Spring. So far, I have only seen one yellow finch, two magpies, and one black crow. There also seems to be a great reduction in the number of other species, as well: one bumble bee, one solitary bat. This is very eerie… dawn after dawn and dusk after dusk the skies are completely empty, except for a handful of sea gulls, and the silence is very disturbing. I don’t know where else to post what I am seeing, RSPB has no page for such observations to be submitted, and no other sites have any like message pages.
I will look to these pages again to check out what is happening on a larger scale, as I hope that what I am seeing is simply a local phenomena.
I just finished a nice morning with a couple of Liberian friends visiting a mangrove swamp outside Monrovia and then a lowland area within Monrovia. The swamp is drying up because the rains haven’t started yet so not much there other than the expected local species, no migrants. At the other site we had a nice selection of plovers and shorebirds including a common redshank which we don’t usually see here. Best bird of the morning was a Purple Swamphen at Brewersville, which is the first I’ve seen in Africa and a life bird for my friends. Tom
I will be at Forsythe National Refuge, NJ. Happy Mother’s day to me 🙂